If Nick Saban moves to Austin where would he live?

What kind of house would Nick and Terry Saban Buy if (ahem When) they move to Austin? The rumor mill is buzzing with all kinds of news about a new head coach at UT. And if you ask me, it’s about time. So who is this Nick Saban anyway, and why should I care?

Well, Football is pretty big here in Texas. OK not pretty big. It’s HUGE. I moved here many years ago from northern California. I grew up watching the Montana-Rice dynasty in the 80’s and followed the long time Stanford-Cal game rivalry. I thought I knew football.

No way. Not even close. I knew nothing. And it was made evident to me when I was invited to my first Longhorn tailgate party when I first arrived to town. I asked what I could bring, and when I should show up on Saturday, and they answered – don’t worry – we have a professional caterer coming from Thursday morning until game time, so just stop by when you can. They were BBQing for 3 days straight in a parking lot near the stadium. That’s hardcore.

He is the highest paid College football coach, earning 5.4 Million per year. And he deserves it. Especially after leading Alabama to 3 titles in just a few short years. Sort of like the kind of thing the Longhorns are in need of right now. There are a few reasons he might leave ‘bama for Texas. One is that in the last few seasons The Crimson Tide has had a hard time filling all the seats in their stadium. Granted, it’s tough to fill 101,821 seats at Bryant-Denny, but DKR in Austin has only 1702 fewer seats (100,119), and is sold out even with the horrible record under Mac Brown every weekend. Also because of recruiting, UT seems to have a leg up on Alabama. Plus, we are Austin. Need I say more.

So now that it is a given that he is going to move to Texas and Coach UT football (at least in my mind), what kind of house is he going to buy?

Let’s start, as I always do with their lifestyle.

They have 2 older kids

He loves Golf

He is a devout Roman Catholic

And he loves music

And since he is a college football coach, he doesn’t have a whole heck of a lot of time for anything else. But they do need a large house to host all the guests, VIPS, players, and friends who come in and out of their home on a weekly basis.

This is Austin, and people who move to Austin don’t need much more, because we bring live music, lake parties, ACL, SXSW, F1, amazing food, and a whole bunch of other great things to the table when it comes to creating a lifestyle.

As for his style in homes, we all know that is usually left up to the wife, and in his case, Terry is a licensed agent in Alabama.

What? Terry Saban is a Realtor? What brokerage would she join when she moves to Austin? I digress.

A quick search of agents and brokers with current active licenses does not currently show Terry Saban, and she has gone on the record as they “are not going anywhere” (As reported in the Wall Street Journal). At one point before October she stated they were interested in purchasing a vacation home in Austin, and at other times Austin’s most successful residential broker has joked on Facebook that her husband has shown up at some of his open houses.

Back to the topic at hand- what kind of house would they buy. Perhaps it would be something on the lake similar to his recently auctioned off 6 bedroom, 9 bathroom vacation house. He had this home as well as another on Lake Burton, but this one sold at Auction early last summer for an undisclosed price. Asking was $10.95 Million.

Anyway here are possible Austin houses for The Sabans:

Here’s a nice 8-bedroom 9-bathroom 9700 square foot place on the water listed for $12.5M. (but I have it on good information that they will seriously evaluate offers in the low 10’s). Offered by Cord Shiflet of Moreland Properties.

If that’s too rich for his blood (even with an estimated $10M yearly contract with UT), perhaps this 7-bedroom, 9-bath French Chateau inspired lakehouse listed at $4,900 less than $10 million is more up their alley. Offered by Margaret Parma of Capital City Sotheby’s

My personal favorite is the most affordable option is this Italian style villa offered by Amy Mills of Realty Austin. With 6 bedrooms and 13 baths it has a great price of only $9,500,000.

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